


Destcember 2019

by KrastBannert



Series: Moments [6]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Christmas, Destcember (Destiny), Destcember 2019, Feels, Fireteam Storm, Holidays, Hope, Light Angst, Not Beta Read, Regret, Snow, The Dawning (Destiny)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 15:21:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21640303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KrastBannert/pseuds/KrastBannert
Summary: Prompts for Destcember 2019, consisting of one prompt a day for entire month of December.Otherwise known as a collection of short stories featuring OCs and canon characters themed around winter, the winter holidays, and The Dawning.
Relationships: Wolfram Siegfried Adler & Lyudmila Atolyevna Sokolov, Wolfram Siegfried Adler & Sara Jane Kaiserin, Wolfram Siegfried Adler & Suraya Hawthorne
Series: Moments [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1164740





	1. A New Look

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hawthorne gives Sig a needed second set of eyes.

_"My past is everything I failed to be." - Fernando Pessoa_ , The Book of Disquiet

-[-]-

She stepped into the cave opening, flicking on her flashlight. Her eyes flicked left, then right, ears straining in the quiet. She sucked in her breath and bared her rifle. The cave was quiet, airy, the gentle babble of the stream at her feet mixing with the pitter-patter of the rain.

She picked her way through the cave, working across piles of rubble and ducking under stalactites before the cave opened up to a chamber, a hole in the side of the cave granting a breathtaking view of the river below. Trees covered the sides of the valley, the river wound slowly at the bottom. She could _just_ see the Farm over the treetops. Any other day, she would have stared at the view endlessly.

But not today. Today, just as Big Blue had said…he was there.

He sat by himself, huddled in one of the front seats. He stared up at a carved wooden statue – Hawthorne didn’t know what it was of, but it was beautiful. Candles dotted around the base bathed the walls in a warm orange glow. From her angle, she could see his face glistening. He sniffed and wiped at his face.

It broke something in Hawthorne to know that he, the man who’d saved her life, a legendary hero, was here. By himself, away from his friends and family. Crying, silent...and alone.

She coughed gently.” Penny for your thoughts?”

He scoffed, gestured for her to step forwards, apparently unsurprised that she was there. She pulled up a chair and settled next to him, rifle cast aside. Sig was silent for several moments before he spoke.” Zavala tell you I was up here?”

“Yeah, he did. Under duress, of course,” she replied, a tight smile on her face. Sig chuckled; it was dry and forced, unlike his normal warm rumble. He didn’t reply, instead choosing to stare into the dancing flames of the candles. She followed his eyes, trying to see what he saw. She’d never been religious, but she’d learned quickly that Sig was – and heard some of the stories about him, of course.

She’d heard many stories of ‘the people’s Guardian’ when she was growing up.

“It’s been almost a month now, and I don’t know that they’ve forgiven me yet.” His voice startled her.” Think they ever will?”

Hawthorne raised an eyebrow.” How long were you gone for, again?”

“Hundred and three years, eight months, six days, two hours, and forty eight minutes.”

“You remember that time exactly?”

“Yep.”

“Huh,” Hawthorne mused. She folded her in arms in her poncho.” Well, you know I don’t exactly care for you Guardian types, and I don’t know how they would feel, but I gotta imagine having no contact like that would be pretty awful.”

“Tell me about it,” he whispered. Sig turned to look at her, cheeks glistening in the candlelight. His eyes were red and puffy.” I’ve always felt like I had somewhat of an idea of what to do. But now I…I have no idea what I’m doing. I didn’t realize that it hurt them this badly.”

Hawthorne reached between them and rubbed his arm gently.” It’s just a shock to them. I mean, you vanish in the middle of the night…then show up again like it’s nothing. Just…take it slow, you know?”

Sig reached over and grasped her hand. She could feel the raw strength and power radiating off of him – but his grip was tentative and gentle. It was like when she’d shook Zavala’s hand the first time, a week ago. Gentle, tentative, a certain warmth. They watched the shadows of the candles, tiny figures dancing to unseen music before their eyes.

“You know I…I wrote each one of them a letter every single day?” He finally whispered.” I couldn’t send them, the equipment here couldn’t receive the signals I could send, but I still wrote them.”

Hawthorne looked at him.” Do they know that?” He shook his head.” You…you could show them the letters. When you’re ready.”

Sig nodded slowly. Abruptly he sat up, closed his eyes, and breathed in deeply. She watched his chest rise, then steady, then fall moments later, the air whistling out of his lungs. He opened his eyes to face her; his gray orbs sparkled for the first time since she’d gotten here.” Thanks, Hawthorne. That was…unexpected, but…you helped.”

“But I…I didn’t do anything?” She asked, confused.

Sig smiled.” You gave me a new look at the situation. And I think I needed that.”

Hawthorne smiled, her heart rising at his smile.” Happy to be of service.”


	2. A Glimmer of Hope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A moment to think...and hope.

_"Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come, whispering, 'It will be happier'..." - Alfred, Lord Tennyson_

-[-]-

Seven years.

It had been seven excruciating years.

Seven long years since the City fell in smoke, and fire. The Almighty arrived six years ago. The Vanguard returned to Terra five-and-a-half years ago. And five years ago, we started to fight back.

We returned to a different planet. A world under occupation. I had lost hope the day the City fell. We lost more in that first day than we did in the Great Disaster.

When the Age of Triumph ended, my descent began. What hope I had fell away with each transmission we received that ended in gunfire, screams, and the tearing of bone and flesh. With each dead body and each dead Ghost we found, I lost hope. And with the Massacre of the New Pacific Arcology, the last of my hope fell away.

I thought fighting to be pointless. What use was there, without the Light? Without the _Traveler_? Without the things that I thought made us _Guardians_ , we couldn’t hope to fight back. Bullets, shells, rockets, and grenades served their purpose, but without the ability to fight, die, learn, and fight again, how could we have hoped to achieve victory?

And then, in the blink of an eye, everything changed.

A Guardian appeared on Titan. One I had not seen nor heard of in nearly a century; she had been missing for nearly that entire time. Even before that, she had stuck to the edges, never excelling, but never failing.

But she had her Light. Her _Light_ – and she tore the Hive that infested Siren’s Watch and The Rig apart. By her side stood a Fallen, an Eliksni, speaking English, fighting alongside her like they were meant to be together – and he calmed the Fallen scrounging the Arcology, and turned the from enemies to tentative allies.

At that point, something began to crack.

It cracked more when I was reunited with my fireteam on Earth, when I embraced Cayde and Ikora for the first time in nearly a year and a half. And then, when we learned what the Almighty was capable of, and when I saw what the Red Legion had done to Earth, the City, and her people in the previous five years…I felt, again, ready to break.

But I watched as the people of Earth trained, fought, bled, and died alongside lightless Guardians. I watched as we began to take the fight to the Red Legion. I listened as the people cheered, as they mourned, as they fought, as they cried, and as they laughed. And something grew in place of the fear – hesitant and slow, but it grew still.

I didn’t want to give it a name, but I had an idea of what it could be. And I was certain that others felt it, too.

And now, it was December Second; the seventh anniversary of the Fall of the City. I stood in a ditch, north of Trostland. The snow was packed several inches deep, my boots buried in a disgusting soup of mud, snow, and water. Flurries drifted down around me; the sun hid behind the clouds. I looked to my right – there stood a woman who I, five years ago, had hated. Now, though…I smiled when I looked at her, and my heart fluttered with pride and butterflies crowded my stomach whenever I heard the name _Suraya_.

I looked to my left, and lined up as far as I could see, packed three deep in the trench, were Guardians. A gathering of Guardians, both young and old, both those who would have the Light again someday…and those who wouldn’t.

“Feeling alright, big guy?” Hawthorne’s voice reached my ears. I looked down, a smile on my lips underneath my faceplate.

“For once…yes, Suraya. Yes I am.”

And it was true, because for the first time in seven long years, standing shoulder to shoulder in that trench, my heart pounding inside me as I waited to give the ‘go’ signal, the snow swirling around me, my rifle resting in my arms like a ton of bricks…I could put a name to that feeling that had been growing inside me. It was small, but I could name it: _hope_.

A small glimmer of hope that one day…we would win.


End file.
